Becoming a roadside attraction (for an evening)

"How close to the interstate is your house?" is not a question one expects to receive via text. Especially a friend who lives in Nashville. Yet this was how my home became an impromptu roadside attraction last evening for the Collin's family. I shouldn't be so surprised. It's not that unusual for me to host private art viewings at my home for potential art buyers. But usually it's scheduled a few days in advance to give me time to clean up. On this occasion, I barely had enough time to get home from work and make the bed before these guests arrived.

But out-of-town visitors are rare. This is only the second time I've had the honor. It was good to see Robyn again and give a little tour to her kids. Everyone even got to leave with a signed Chester greeting card. Hey, you can't be a real roadside attraction without some souvenirs.

Katy Tucker: Guest Artist at the Stirring for May

 
Our guest artist at The Stirring during May is Katy Tucker. Katy has been creating some really great artwork live on stage this month. If you've never been to The Stirring, I strongly encourage you to come check it out. The Stirring meets every Sunday at 5:30 p.m. at Hope Church at 8500 Walnut Grove Rd. in Cordova, Tennessee. For more information, visit www.thestirring.net. 

 

Amber Rubarth - Final Poster art

Just wanted to share with you the final poster art and email banner for Amber Rubarth's tour in Europe. It's very exciting to see it complete and in use on her facebook page and emails. There was talk of a t-shirt based on the illustration but I haven't seen it yet. I've even received some nice comments and emails from her fans.

 

And for comparison, below is my original art.

 

File this music video under art inspiration

Kina Grannis - Valentine from Ross Ching on Vimeo.


Now, I'm not really a fan of the song itself (good melody but the lyrics are a little too cutesy). What I really find inspiring is the flip-book style animation of the guy looking for a valentine. That's why i keep watching the video. I wish there were more proposals than just the three shown. I want to talk about them but I dont want to spoil it for you. So just watch it.

Anyway, i thought it was pretty clever and original video. Makes me think of Chester and his Anti-Valentine cards.

Going on tour with Amber Rubarth

So a few people have asked me "So how do you know Amber Rubarth?" since I started posting some pictures on facebook of an illustration that I've been working on for her European tour. So here's the long story. Amber Rubarth is one of my favorite singer/songwriters. I first heard her play at Otherlands in Dec 2009. It was a very sad time for me. My wife had left me two month prior and I had finally begun to accept that she wasn't coming back. Because many of Amber Rubarth's songs paint a picture of heartbreak, hope, and healing,  it really spoke and connected with me. It seemed as if the songs had been written just for me... to help give me the words I needed for the grief and pain, to help me find hope, and to help me find love again. Her songs became the sound track for my life for much of 2010.

Take "Novacaine" for example. I can relate so much to this song. I dont think you could write a more perfect song about how we deal with heartbreak. I even had an experience like the one mentioned in the song: "I ran into the doc last weekend at the grocery superstore. He asked me how's it feeling and I said it's barely sore." I did many paintings and drawings playing with the meaning and imagery of that song.

“Dormant” © Richard Fudge 2010 Inspired by Amber Rubarth’s “When Will the Spring Come Again”

 

I ended up doing many drawings and paintings inspired by the lyrics of her songs. It is not unusual for me to gravitate to certain songs or to attach songs to the inspiration or meaning of a painting. I often list "recommended listening" with photos of new work on this blog. But I don't believe that a single artist has directly influenced more work than Amber Rubarth.

When she came back to Memphis in Oct 2010, I was excited to see her play again. So before her set, I gave her a print of one of my doodles (Dormant shown above) and I requested that she play the song that had inspired the drawing. It's a good thing I had requested it because it wasn't on her set list. In fact, it had been so long since she'd played "When Will the Spring Come Again" that while on stage she asked "Richard, is this the right strumming?"

It was amazing how much things had changed in my life since the last time I had heard her play at Otherlands. I had lost my love, stopped believing in love, and learned to love again. The first time I saw her play I was alone and heartbroken, this time I was holding hands with a beautiful girl who loved me and whom I loved.

 

Fast forward to March 2011, Amber Rubarth emailed me to see if I was interested in doing an illustration for her to use on her upcoming tour. Um... YEAH!!  I was extremely excited to work with an artist who's music I so admire and had influenced my art. It's been one of my top 5 art goals to be commissioned to illustrate a favorite band's cover art or poster.

So below is the finished project. Well, the painting is finished. I just put the text in there as an example of how it might look with some copy. I'm just doing the illustration work on the poster. Someone else is doing the rest of the poster. I'll post an update when I get a sample of the finished poster, but for now you can enjoy the below painting and the song that inspired it. Hopefully, I'll get to work with Amber again and you can see more of the work here.

 

Book Update: Still at work

I'm either nearing the halfway point or I'm just past it. Although there have been a lack of updates, I have been keeping to my schedule. Sometimes you just have to give yourself a deadline, show up, and hope your creativity shows up too.  So I've got 3 main pages to complete. Seven pages are finished. But then I have the smaller inset illustrations. Below are a look at some of the finished pages. In other news, Chester may soon go on tour with one of my favorite singer/songwriters. More on that later.